Because i'm an old Southern woman and i'm supposed to wear stupid hats, and ugly clothes , and grow vegetables in the dirt. . .

Long ago, when we first eye-balled this house, I decided that the old foundation in the back yard was perfect for growing my vegetable garden, and boy I was hell bent for leather on growin' one ! I had decided that we were going to go 'green'  and grow as much of our own food and such as possible, and just be more environmentally conscious in general. Having only just taken up flower gardening last year , growing my own food was a bigger leap than I realized .

I may have told you before that we don't set out to make things complicated, but in this family we sure do have a gift for them ending up that way . As usual, this vegetable garden was destined to be a journey all it's own. . .

It was about three months between the time we selected the house, and the time we moved in. Ironically , we selected it in early spring, prime planting season ( sure I know that NOW ) . When we moved in June 7th , Bubba the horticulturist assured me , "it is NEVER too late to plant." Well , by the time I " got around to it " one early morning the last week or so of June , I pulled into the local greenhouse only to be told that they were closed for the season. I drove to another and was told the same thing . "Fine" I told myself,"then I'll just go to voldemart , they should still have some."

As luck would have it , Voldemart DID still have some , and I spent the next hour combing through the leftovers of greater Mayberry. By the end of that hour I had selected the sorriest crop of seedlings you ever did see. Just a handful of this and that , and a few packets of seeds . As I awaited my turn at the checkout , it seemed every redneck in spitting distance had to come eyeball my cart. Eventually , a fella with a mouth full of chewin' tabaccy made the brilliant observation " well you must be one of them there folks that likes a challenge , he-yuck , he-yuck ".  Not particulairly, but at that moment I had dreams of producing mountians of corn and tomatoes with my measely and pitiful little plants, if for no other reason than to bring them back and pelt him with them.

The poor bastards sat on my porch for two days before anything managed to get done with them.


When all was said and done poor Bubba had to plant them because Munchkin was on a bender and I had to wrangle her , and he assured me that if we didn't plant them soon , they were gonna croak.


So , Bubba planted my pitiful plants , and at the end of the day , I had a beautiful veggie garden , and could feel like I had fullfilled my duty as a stereotypical old southern woman. All I had to do was water the poor things ! This should be easy, right ? I mean hell, how hard can waterin' be ? My roses look great ! I can SO do this !


I forgot . For the first 2 days, I forgot.

Then one day , I looked out the laundry room window and saw all the poor little buggers all wilting in the sun , and I said " Sweet baby Jesus ! I better get them poor things some water ! "  So I ran out into the yard and got the hose from the front of the house ( since I hadn't hooked up the one in back yet ) turned that sucker on and ran like the wind into the back yard . I was stopped abruptly at the southwest corner of the garden when I ran out of hose .

Now I know what yer thinkin'. Well just put your thumb over it stupid and shoot the water into the garden, right ? Well I will have you know I DID , and the water pressure on that stupid fancy curly-cue hose sucks ! The damn thing would just barely dribble on the corner tomato plant and go no further .

That was when I decided to hook up the damn back yard hose . Only problem there was that When I started looking, there was no where in the damn back yard for me to hook the stupid hose to. You see , in all my excited veggie garden planning , I neglected to check out one key element . " How in the hell am I going to water these things once I have planted them ? " Ladies and gentelmen, ALWAYS ask yourselves that question BEFORE you plant a dang garden !  It was at this point that I threw my hands up in exasperation and went back into the house .

The next day , Bubba came to visit . He took one look at our garden and went screamin' into the back yard  yellin' " my babies ! My babies ! " ( and let me tell you , when you see a 6'9 tough guy do this , it is a sight to see ! ) He glared at me accusingly and said , in the most pitiful voice I have ever heard come out of his mouth  , " they need water ! " He very quickly discovered what I had found out the day before .

The next couple of hours were spent dumping buckets of miracle grow water over the plants by hand .

They have perked up a bit , but i'm not holding my breath .

Time shall tell if anything edible ever comes out of that thing .

In the meantime I'm tryin' to nail down a damn plumber to see about putting in a stupid spigot.

Who the hell builds a house without a backyard spigot ?

I guess that's what we get for falling in love with an almost 100 year old house .

Goodness, the things we do for love .